


Silent Watch

by FalseRoar



Series: Traces of Silver [3]
Category: Who Killed Markiplier? (Web Series), jacksepticeye - Fandom, markiplier - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Monster Hunters, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Angst, Curses, Demonic Possession, Gen, Mark Fischbach Egos, POV Alternating, POV Second Person, POV Third Person, Pre-Who Killed Markiplier?, Sean McLoughlin Egos, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-25
Updated: 2020-04-25
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:34:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 11,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23743129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FalseRoar/pseuds/FalseRoar
Summary: This is a prequel to Silver and Peppermint, taking place before WKM, before Abe met the DA, before Y/N even was a DA. Before a lot of things. This is the story of how Y/N met an actor, but not the one you’re thinking of, and one terrible night that changed both their lives forever.If you’ve read Silver and Peppermint or are familiar with the character of Jameson Jackson, you might be able to guess where this is going.
Relationships: Y/N | The District Attorney & Jameson Jackson
Series: Traces of Silver [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1709179
Comments: 1
Kudos: 27





	1. Mr. Jackson

The lights strung up all around the field and crisscrossing over the partygoers’ heads provided a soft, uneven glow to everything, but as you went around with tray in hand and a poor attempt at a smile plastered on your face, you noticed more than one of the caterers and locals among the crew looking up at the darkening sky with varying degrees of worry. Despite the many, many reassurances from the town elders and the slightly more flippant response from the assistant director that everything would be fine with the proper precautions, you knew many of your temporary coworkers wished the film crew could have just had their wrap party within the familiar boundaries of the town itself.

“And did it have to be so late?” whispered another caterer when you returned to the staging area for another tray full of ridiculously small appetizers. You recognized him from school; actually, most of the locals hired to fill out the cast and crew while they were filming in and around town were around your age or not much older, and you wondered more than once over the past couple of weeks how many of the others were saving up for similar reasons as your own. “Why couldn’t they just wait until tomorrow afternoon?”

“Because there are some party activities you can only really have fun with after dark,” one of the girls answered with a wink that sent her and a couple of nearby caterers into a giggling fit.

“They’re planning on packing everything up and leaving tomorrow,” you added, once they had calmed down a bit. “I think they’d rather use the daylight to get out of here.”

Your fingertips brushed against the silver chain connected to your belt loop, the other end reaching into your pocket, and you felt a familiar calm settle over you as you added, “We’ll be fine as long as we stay out of the woods tonight. You all know that.”

“You working tomorrow?” asked the first caterer, who seemed visibly surprised when you shook your head ‘no.’ “What, really? You’ve been pulling more shifts than any of us, _and_ still working at the bakery every morning before school, how are you not working the last day?”

You shrug at the sarcasm in his voice, not wanting to admit that you had asked only to be told you needed to choose between working tomorrow or tonight. Apparently, the crew director didn’t believe anyone would show up the next morning after a night shift, and working the party offered the chance for more hours and more pay.

And you needed all the help you could get.

“Do you ever stop and actually have time for, I don’t know, fun Y/N?” asked one of the girls.

“Have you ever even been to a party before?” asked another. “You could always leave your tray with one of us and maybe get to know some of the stars—”

“I’m good,” you interrupted, trying your best to ignore the new round of giggling as you grabbed a ready tray and turned back to face the party.

Most of the people here were part of the crew, faces you had come to know over the past month or so with the occasional name to go with them, but as you threaded your way through the laughing, chatting partyers, you did pass more than one actor or actress who until recently had only existed on a big screen or in a washed out picture in the newspaper. They seemed occupied enough with the drinks and recounting stories to keep the inevitable crowd around them entertained, but the star of the show, of this whole production, was nowhere to be seen among all of the festivities.

That is, until you turned at a call for a new glass and ran straight into him.

Spinach and mushroom puffs tumbled to the grass below and it was all you could do to keep the whole tray from spilling, his hands reaching to help you regain balance.

“Sorry, sorry!”

You were surprised to hear him saying it too, and once sure you were okay his face broke into an open, easy smile.

“Sorry, I can be a bit clumsy. Works out well on the screen, not so much in real life.”

“It was my fault, Mr. Jackson, I wasn’t—”

Your apology, more out of reflex from too much time spent dealing with angry customers in your other job than anything else, was quickly cut short.

“Please, you can call me Jameson, or—”

“Excuse me, Mr. Jackson?”

Jameson Jackson paused, his smile slipping as he glanced at the interrupter. While most if not everyone here that wasn’t working were dressed in comfortable clothes or, like Jameson in his white shirtsleeves and bright blue vest and bowler hat, whatever they had been wearing in the last scenes to be filmed, this guy was dressed up in a suit and tie, as though expecting a more formal party. He also wasn’t anyone you had seen around before, either on set or in town, although Jameson seemed to recognize him.

“I don’t remember inviting you to the party,” Jameson said, his smile more forced now.

“I just need a minute to ask some questions,” the stranger said, his own smile too wide and yet failing to reach his eyes. “Alone, if we can, unless you want to talk here. Although, knowing how rumors spread…”

Jameson narrowed his eyes, not even pretending at a smile anymore. “Especially when they get help from muckrakers.”

The stranger put a hand to his chest with a mocking gasp. “You wound me, Mr. Jackson. My paper only reports the truth, and I just wanted to give you a chance to present your side of things before certain uncomfortable truths hit the page.”

Uncomfortable truths? You look from Jameson to the reporter, wondering if you should say something or back out of this conversation, but before you could make a move either way, Jameson rolled his eyes and spoke.

“Oh, and I’m sure you won’t twist everything around. Again. I’ll give you five minutes, which is five more than you deserve by this point.”

The reporter smiled and followed Jameson’s gesture with a snide, “So kind of you, Mr. Jackson.”

You were curious, of course, but you couldn’t exactly follow them to the edge of the party, away from the music and crowd and just within the circle of lights. Instead, you could only get back to doing your job and serving the other partygoers while trying to avoid running into anyone else who might be less friendly than Jameson.

You were just trying to fake a smile while waiting for the crew director and one of the actresses to choose from the identical puffs on the tray when you heard the gasps and shock ripple out from the other side of the field. The three of you turned in time to see the reporter stumble back, one hand raised to his bloody nose, while Jameson stalked away from the party with shoulders hunched, his hands shoved deep into his pockets.

“I wonder what that was about,” the actress beside you said as she took a spinach puff from the tray before taking a delicate bite. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Jameson that mad, not even when we had to scrap and reshoot a week’s worth of scenes.”

“Is that the guy from _The Morrow Gazette_? What is he doing here?” asked the crew director, narrowing her eyes as she watched the reporter stumble away in the direction of town. “I _told_ security to keep him away from the set and crew, what are they even doing?”

Drinking a few beers somewhere between here and town, not that you thought you should mention that. Instead, you asked, “Where is Jameson going?”

“Ah, he’ll be fine, he just needs to cool off,” the crew director said, then muttered something under her breath about wishing he’d punched that reporter harder.

The actress glanced at you and lowered her voice, even though you could still clearly hear her ask, “Is it true what they’ve been saying? About the studio being broke?”

“You’re still getting paid, if that’s what you’re worried about,” the crew director answered. “We’ve hit a few snags here and there, but—”

“It didn’t look like he was going toward town,” you interrupted. “Jameson, he has a ward on him, right?”

The worry steadily growing inside you immediately skyrocketed when you saw the blank expressions on their faces, even before the actress asked, “A what?”

She was too stunned for a moment to do anything but take the tray you shoved toward her, her surprised exclamation following behind the crew director’s shout as you turned and took off running.

You bit your lip but kept on running in the direction you last saw Jameson. After all, it was your last night on the job. What were they going to do, fire you?


	2. Into the Woods

You soon reached the trailers and cars set up around the set and slowed down long enough to call out, “Mr. Jackson? Jameson?”

There was no answer as you wandered among the trailers, guided more by your memory than what little the moonlight overhead could do, and you found yourself reaching into your pocket to feel the familiar weight of the pocket watch there, the raised lines of the elaborate metalwork on its cover.

It was the single most precious thing you owned, the memory of the giver almost as important as the spell on it designed to protect its bearer. Everyone in your town possessed a ward of some kind, only a maniac would risk going out without one.

But then, most of the cast and crew had come from the cities, where sealed walls and regular patrols kept them safe. For them, the stories of what lurked in the woods near your town were just legends or things that happened to other people. You remembered some of the actors and actresses even laughing about the warnings the town had given them before filming, calling the crew who left before dark superstitious or lazy.

You had been one of those to always work as late as possible, but that was only because you needed the money and you trusted the warded watch to keep you safe.

Now, as you caught sight of the figure in the distance walking along the tree line, shoulders still hunched with his hands in his pockets as he kicked away a stone, you gripped the silver pocket watch and took a deep, steadying breath before running after him.

As long as you had the watch, you were safe. Jameson, on the other hand…

“Mr. Jackson! Jameson, wait!”

He didn’t hear you, and you cursed under your breath as you ran under the shade of the hanging limbs and stumbled through a clinging bush before finding the trail barely visible in the moonlight. Minutes later, you spotted the bright blue vest on the trail up ahead and this time, when you called, he turned around.

“What are you doing out here?” he asked, staring in surprise as you ran right up to him and gave him a shove, made harder by how far he made you chase him. “Ow!”

“What am I—What are _you_ doing, going off into the woods, _at night_ , without even a ward to protect you?” You gasped for breath but still had enough to add, “You idiot!”

“A what?” he asked, and you nearly hit him again.

“A ward, a protective charm, _something_ , these woods are dangerous even in the daytime, you can’t just go wandering off alone—”

Jameson seemed surprised at your words, but that’s not what made you pause when he looked around, as though astonished to find himself so far within the trees that neither the party nor the town could be seen anymore.

It was dark, and you might have been tempted to write off the red in Jameson’s eyes as tiredness or maybe even from a drink or two from the party, but something in the slump of his shoulders, in the way that he wouldn’t quite look at you…

“Have you been crying?”

Jameson looked as though he were going to argue, but then sighed and sat down on the raised root of a tree. “Is it that obvious?”

You hesitated before sitting down next to him, trying to ignore the desire to get out of here and back to the safety of the others. After an awkward silence where you tried to figure out what to say, you decided to just ask, “…Do you want to talk about it?”

Jameson chuckled. “Not really.”

He sighed, rubbing a hand over his dark mustache that you suspected might be fake, his feet tapping on the ground as though sitting still for even a moment was too much to ask, and then blurted out anyways, “I’ve never lost my temper like that before, I swear, I don’t know what came over me, I just…”

His fingers interlocked and twisted together while he worked himself up to continuing, and when he did you noticed that his voice sounded…different. You hadn’t noticed it before, but apparently Jameson had been faking a generic American accent. Now, either because he had forgotten or was too upset to keep it up, you could hear the vowels and emphasis on certain words shifting, sounding more British if you had to guess, although you couldn’t narrow it down more than that.

You realized, despite all of the fame he had gained, despite the responsibility of owning and running his own studio, despite the larger than life character he played on the screen and in front of everyone else, he really wasn’t that much older than you. It wasn’t something that had occurred to you until you heard the soft sniffle before he spoke.

“Have you ever hoped and worked so hard for something, and been terrified that you might lose it all, and there’s nothing you can do to stop it?”

“…I can imagine.”

You could feel his stare on you, prompting you to explain further even if you would rather not.

After a long silence and some fidgeting of your own, you managed to wrestle out the words, “I’ve wanted to be a lawyer, ever since…for a long time. And there’s this college with a great law school that could make that happen, and I got in.”

You felt the pride at those last three words, and the familiar sting of the ones that followed. “But it’s expensive, and I don’t…I think I can make it, there are scholarships and I have a meeting with the admissions officer in a few months—”

But if it wasn’t enough…You swallowed, trying to banish those thoughts before they could start to spiral again.

Jameson exhaled, his silhouette in the darkness looking up at the branches overhead. “It’s always money, isn’t it?”

You started to ask what that’s supposed to mean before recalling one of the actresses’ words. “Is your studio really out of money?”

Jameson shrugged. “We might as well be. Near every dime I’ve had has gone into this studio, and even that hasn’t been enough, not with one disaster after another.”

He opened his hand and began to list them off on his fingers. “Studio fire, burned three sets to the ground and took sixty feet of film with it. Film that’s just gone missing or been corrupted. Red tape every time I turn around, permits that were signed and filed but suddenly can’t be found just when we start rolling. Stars coming down with the flu and setting schedules back weeks. I’ve lost count of how many studio hands have been injured and sent home with broken bones or concussions, or how many close calls I’ve had myself.”

He pulled back the collar of his shirt and you could just make out the white line of a bandage before he let it drop back into place with another heavy sigh.

“At this rate, the best I can hope for is that this movie makes enough to pay off the bank. No wonder that lousy muckraker thinks I’m cursed.”

“That’s what he said to you?”

“Among other things.” Jameson considered and then shook his head, apparently having decided against sharing some of the more colorful language with you. “Of course, once word gets out how bad the studio’s doing, no one’s going to want to touch us. The pictures are booming, so what does that say about a studio that has managed to bust at every turn? I had to pull every last string I had just to get the cast and crew for this film, and then shoot it out in the middle of nowhere because it’s the only site we could afford. No offense.”

“What, that you called this place the middle of nowhere? Why do you think I want to get out of here so bad?”

Well, it was one reason.

You watched Jameson out of the corner of your eye, taking in the slumped figure of the nearly broken man beside you before coming to a decision.

“I think I know a way to break your curse.”


	3. When You Need it to Be

The words were impulsive and you regretted them almost immediately, but Jameson just gave a weak, humorless chuckle.

“Oh, really? And how do you propose to break this ‘curse’?”

You felt the heat rising in your face and for a moment you’re glad it’s so dark that he can’t possibly see you clearly. Still, you tell yourself as you pull the silver watch out of your pocket and take in the familiar weight in your hand, it might help to take his mind off things. Even just a little bit of belief could go a long way.

“I guess you never really needed them in the city, but in my town every person has a ward. Every single person has at least one item that’s been made to protect its owner. Little kids wear iron rings with special symbols written into the metal while it’s still hot, to keep them safe from creatures and beings that would take them away. Most of the rings are hand me downs, because usually people get a more personalized ward on their thirteenth birthday. It’s kind of traditional.”

You decide not to mention that you wore an iron ring until you were sixteen, or why.

You did, however, tell him, “My grandfather gave me mine. This watch here used to be his, and he carried it with him every single day. When he gave it to me, he told me that there was a very strong magic written into its making.”

Written by your grandmother, he told you, and asked if you remembered her. You had nodded, even though by that point she was more a series of impressions and feelings left behind mixed with the stories told to you than the memory of a person.

“He said that this watch was made to keep its bearer grounded in the moment while reminding them how precious every second is. That no spell, no bewitchment or curse, or anything that would hurt them, could stop that second hand from moving forward. And as long as they kept moving forward with it, they would be okay.”

And he had looked you in the eye when you asked if he was sure he wanted to give it to you, and he had smiled as he reminded you of long days spent wandering off on your own, of stories of the trouble you used to get into as a child (and maybe some trouble a little more recent).

_You need all the help you can get._

You smiled in spite of yourself at the memory of those words, of his voice.

And you could hear the smile in Jameson’s voice as he said, “Are you sure that’s magic?”

“It is when you need it to be.”

It took an effort, to will yourself to undo the clasp connecting the watch’s silver chain to one of your belt loops, but you did it and silently placed the pocket watch in Jameson’s outstretched hand. You couldn’t, however, bring yourself to let go of the end of the chain. Not here, in these woods at night.

Jameson gently turned the watch over in his hands, his fingertips running over the design on its casing that you knew so well before opening it and tilting it so as to get a better look at its face in the darkness.

Perhaps it was a trick of the moonlight streaming through the trees overhead on your eyes, already straining to see in the darkness, or the way Jameson held the watch, but for a moment a silver light reflected off of the watch and caught his eyes just right, making the irises seem to glow an icy blue.

He blinked and effect disappeared, but Jameson had to pause and start again before he could speak.

“The time’s wrong.”

“What?” you asked. “It can’t be wrong.”

“But it says it’s nearly midnight,” Jameson said, turning the watch so that you could see.

It was your turn to pause as a cold trickle of fear began to slide down your back. The watch couldn’t be wrong, it just couldn’t be, but at the same time it couldn’t have been later than eight o’clock when you and Jameson left the party, and there’s no way the two of you had been talking for that long.

Your mind bounced back and forth between the two options before settling on one truth you were absolutely sure of.

“We need to get back to the others.”

“…Yes, I think you’re right,” Jameson said as he passed the watch back to you and stood up. Dusting his pants off, he added, “Thank you. For coming out here, and everything.”

You stood as well, but before you could answer a different voice spoke, one laced with sarcasm and a thin echo to its words that leant them a menacing tone.

“Yes, thank you s̷o m̶uc̶h.”

Jameson’s eyes widened and he moved to put himself in between you and the figure standing in the center of the path back out of the woods. With just the full moonlight overhead, you could only make out the general shape of a man, but it was enough to get the sense of wrongness coming off of him, from the way the skin hung off of his bones like it couldn’t remember its purpose to the way his head tilted too far to one side as he glared at both of you with empty black eyes.

“Do you know this guy?” Jameson asked over his shoulder without taking his eyes off of the stranger.

“I was about to ask you the same thing.”

The stranger…smiled, or at least its lips pulled back to reveal gleaming white teeth that did not belong in a human mouth.

“Oh, but you w̷i̶l̴l.”

A laugh broke out of its body, joined by faint echoes all around as it raised a hand.

“And believe me when I say, I will be the lā̵̹̱̘̗͗̍̈s̶̝̬̝͙͖̓̾̑͊͊͘t thing you ever know.”


	4. The Stranger

From behind, you could see Jameson’s shoulders square up as he prepared to challenge that threat, but before the first word could leave his mouth, the stranger flung out his hand toward both of you. Even in the dim moonlight filtering down through the trees, you thought you could see movement splitting the air before Jameson doubled over with a sickening sound somewhere between a groan and a desperate gasp for air.

“Jameson!” You reached out, following his hand to the center of his chest, but you couldn’t feel anything there, no blood or torn clothing or anything that the stranger might have thrown at him, nothing except for the spasm of the muscles in the man’s chest as he struggled to take a wheezing breath. You struggled to support him as his knees began to give out while the stranger just laughed.

The sound was no better a second time, and again it didn’t seem to come from the figure in front of you so much as all around, growing more disjointed as it grew closer with each passing second.

“What did you do?!”

The laughter stopped abruptly at your question, the silence following in its wake somehow worse as the stranger moved closer, seeming to miss several steps in between as he suddenly towered over you and Jameson on the ground. This close, you could see something trickling out of the corners of those solid black, unblinking eyes.

“Giving his desperation that little extra e̸d̴g̵e̶. Because you all will do anything if you’re desperate enough.”

You felt Jameson’s grip on your arm tighten and risked looking away from the stranger to see Jameson’s eyes meet your own, his lips moving in a silent plea that you couldn’t read in the darkness.

“̶͛͜D̸̖͒o̸͔͑n’t l̸̞͒o̴͜o̶͋k ä̷̳́w̵̝̌a̴y fr̷ọ̵̌m̸̭͋ m̸e!”

You felt the claw like hand on your throat before, with a strength that did not match his emaciated frame, the stranger dragged you to your feet and pinned you against the trunk of a tree, just high enough that your kicking feet only brushed at the leaves on the ground. You gasped, hands scratching and tearing at the arm holding you up, but the stranger didn’t seem to notice or care even as his arm began to bleed.

Even though you were struggling to breathe, you could still smell when he— _it_ leaned closer, the rot and decay that came with its words.

“You weren’t supposed to be here,” it said, lifeless eyes studying yours as it watched your futile attempts to free yourself. “I had planned to save this, in case our b̸e̷l̴o̸v̷e̷d̴ actor needed some extra persuasion, but this…this could be _fu̵n.”_

The stranger’s other hand, which he did not even need to keep you so helplessly pinned, began to glow in the darkness with a strange, silver light. You only had a second to see him reach toward your chest before everything slowed to a stop. You felt something pierce your chest with all the subtlety of a freight train, as your heart skipped a beat or stopped entirely, but just as suddenly time moved forward again, the stranger turning his head to scoff at the figure behind him.

“A̴fr̵a̴i̴d̵ I forgot about you?”

Jameson wheezed, one hand still pulling the stranger’s elbow back and away from you as he swung with the other.

His fist hit the stranger’s jaw with a sickening crack, but otherwise the other person did not so much as flinch. It was Jameson who took a step back as the stranger only gave him a smile made lopsided by the jawbone hanging at an angle now.

“What…what are you?” Jameson asked, his voice a tight whisper.

That laughter again was his only answer, as something began to pour out of the stranger’s mouth. It looked like a cloud or a mist, hard to see in the darkness except that it had a definite movement and purpose to it and a clear target in mind.

You shouted and tackled the stranger, but there was no resistance from the body that hit the ground. The withered, emaciated body showed none of the inhuman strength it had only seconds ago, and the bloodshot eyes staring up at the sky were lifeless in a different kind of way than the hollow, solid black gaze that had met your own before.

Whatever had been piloting this body was gone, leaving only a broken, twisted corpse in its wake.

A shaky laugh came from behind you as you staggered to your feet, and you turned to see Jameson standing there, head down and shoulders shaking as his fingers gripped his chest as though trying to reach something inside there.

“…Jameson?”

He looked up at you, a smile on his face despite the terror in his eyes.

“Not…quite…”

The actor’s body jolted and twitched before his head lolled forward again.

“Stop…fighting it,” he said, his voice a growl in his chest and unlike anything you had heard from him before now. “I’m in control now. You…are ņ̵̕ơ̴͂t̵̝̗̋h̶in̶g̵̏!”

Jameson’s head thrashed backwards before his stance changed, his hands dropping to his side as though nothing was there to hold them up anymore.

“So…useless,” he said. “Everything you’ve ever had, _wasted_. F̷̆ͅailǔ̶̺ṟ̷͗e̷.”

“That’s not true!” You grabbed Jameson’s shoulders, felt the muscles seizing violently under your hands as you looked him in the eyes. “Jameson, don’t listen to…whatever that thing is, it doesn’t know—”

“About the studio? About how everything you touch b̴̢̜̥̱̉͒̈́rea̷̻͖͎͕͘ks? What everyone is saying about you, you know it’s true. But I can fix it.”

His voice was changing, stuttering less now.

“Don’t worry, I’ll take good care of this life you’ve screwed up. Everything you ever wanted, will be o̴urs.” Jameson looked up at you, the blue in his eyes changing to a green that gleamed in the darkness. “And when I’m done, n̷o̴ o̸n̵e̴ will be able to look away.”

You stared, trying and failing to think of a way to get through to him while wondering if Jameson, the real Jameson, could even hear you anymore. “Jameson—”

Those green eyes flickered up toward you and a cruel smile formed on his lips.

“Do you want to know how I’ll start?”

You took a step back as Jameson advanced, everything in his posture and stance suddenly different. More aggressive.

“Jameson Jackson, the h̴͔̀̚e̵͉͂ro̷̊ that slayed the monster in the woods. Such a shame he couldn’t do anything to save its victim.”

Your eyes darted toward the withered remains on the ground and back toward Jameson as that eerie laugh came from somewhere not quite within the body in front of you.


	5. The Master's Apprentice

“Jameson, please, I know you can hear me,” you said, the words more a desperate hope as you backed away from the actor. Without taking your eyes off of him, you reached into your pocket. “And I know this… _thing_ is making you think every terrible thing it’s saying, but it’s lying. You are more than your movies or your studio or any of all that. Even if they fail, that does not make you a failure.”

You drew out your silver pocket watch, your ward, and summoned up the magic words that went with it as you pressed it into his unresisting hand. The same ones your grandfather gave you when you needed it most.

“You are more than just this one moment in time. I promise, you’re going to be okay, even if it doesn’t seem like it right now.”

You curled Jameson’s fingers around the watch and forced yourself to let go.

Your heart physically hurt to let go, and you fought to keep down the sudden feeling of being open and exposed without your ward to protect you.

As you watched, Jameson looked down and turned his hand to stare at the silver design. After a long, long moment, his thumb slowly moved to press the release, causing the case to open and reveal the face inside and the seconds passing by.

“…” Jameson turned his gaze toward you, and for just a second you saw the same strange silver light in his eyes before he tried to speak.

And then immediately doubled over, the watch held tight in one hand as the other reached for his throat.

“Jameson?!”

You knelt down and had to pause as a wave of nausea rushed over you. Your stomach turned and your hand on Jameson’s shoulder was as much to steady yourself as to try and help him.

He gagged and you could feel the tremors in his shoulders again as his whole body heaved and retched with no relief. A line of blood began to drip from his nose and you briefly saw his eyes flicker black before returning to panic. He was in control, for now, but you both knew that thing was still inside him.

“We need…we need…” you started and stopped, feeling the helplessness spread out around you as your head began to spin.

A dazzling light touched down in the middle of the path, briefly illuminating the woods with a bright golden light before it resolved into the shape of a person.

“I’ve found you, foul fiend! Now prepare to let him go!”

He sounded like a man, although a strange mask hid part of his face, and brilliant blue robes hung down from his shoulders as he brought up a pair of hands glowing with green flames in a fighting stance.

Only to pause and look around, taking in the stranger’s dead body and then you holding the shuddering and shivering Jameson. He looked again at the corpse and let out a long string of swears before lowering his hands and letting the green flames die away.

“New host?” he asked after a moment of silence, pointing at Jameson.

“I—y-yes?” you answered hesitantly, feeling the ache of a major headache coming on. “There was…something inside of that man and it-it went into Jameson and I don’t…I don’t…”

You let the words trail off as the headache worsened, like a pickax driving into the left side of your brain, but the new stranger just nodded.

“No time to waste then. Hold on tight, the first time can be rough.”

Before you could gather your thoughts together to even ask, the man rubbed his hands together as though trying to warm them up before dropping into a crouch, one hand pressed solidly against the ground while the other went around your shoulders to grab Jameson’s shaking arm.

This close, you could just hear him mutter something under his breath, but the individual words swirled together in your mind as you watched the light spread from his hand into the shape of a circle before the ground itself dropped out beneath you.

You cried out, arms reflexively wrapping themselves around Jameson and in turn the new stranger, eyes shut tight to block out the brilliant swirl of light and colors all around until they just as suddenly stopped.

“Normally I wouldn’t stop you, but again, we don’t have a lot of time here.”

You opened your eyes in time to see a bright blue eye wink on the other side of that weird mask and released your grip on the magician so that he could straighten up and walk away. You blinked, eyes struggling to adjust after the darkness of the woods followed by…whatever that just was, and gradually took in the strange place you and Jameson had found yourselves in.

Old-fashioned iron braziers hanging on the stone walls held torches, already lighting the circular room with a flickering glow that didn’t quite reach all the way to the ceiling, where a glass dome overhead put you in mind of an eye looking down, with the full moon overhead nearly at its center. There was a desk on one side, or the suggestion of one underneath a leaning pile of giant books and open scrolls with their ends hanging down to the floor, matching the general disarray all around the room, with more texts stacked around teeming bookshelves and other wooden shelves holding much stranger things, from jars containing liquids and powders varying from salt to a dark, viscous liquid in which floated something you’d rather not look too closely at. There were also several chalkboards near the desk, their surfaces covered in a mix of scrawling handwriting and other shapes that might be a language you didn’t recognize.

Only the center of the room was clear of any of the strange debris, leaving space for a large circle drawn onto the stone floor using chalk where you and the actor remained crouched. You were dimly aware of another, smaller circle nearby, this one a more permanent fixture made using iron maybe, but the more you looked around, the more your head spun trying to make sense of any of this.

“Who are you?” you asked, and then when you felt Jameson’s shoulders lurch as he tightened in on himself again, your silver watch clenched tight to his chest, “Can you help Jameson?”

“Is that his name?” the masked man asked over his shoulder as he practically sprinted over to the desk and grabbed a book left open on top before taking a look at the messy writing on the chalkboards. “I’m Marvin. The Magnificent, if I do say so myself.”

“…Really?”

“Trust me, you’ll be saying the same thing once I’ve saved your friend. Speaking of, look at his eyes, tell me what you see.”

“Uh, they’re…” You leaned closer, trying to get a good look, and Jameson managed to force them open long enough to give you a silent plea before they snapped shut again. “There’s blood, the corner of his eye—”

“Color?” Marvin interrupted. “His eyes, not the blood.”

“They’re back to blue. They were green, when that—what was that thing, what did it do to him?”

You felt a hand on your shoulder and looked up to see the magician standing beside you, the mouth beneath his mask set into a grimace as he knelt to take a look for himself.

“It’s difficult to explain, but there are—spirits isn’t the right word, those are something else entirely—let’s say entities out there, bodiless things loosely attached to our plane of existence that want…well, it varies, but occasionally one of these things takes an interest in humanity. Particularly how the right humans can be…open to, or made to be more hospitable for those entities to hitch a ride in, especially if they’re at their lowest, most desperate point. Like your friend here.” Marvin gently turned Jameson’s hand, just enough so that he could see the watch held tight within it, and a new note of interest entered his voice. “What is this?”

“A ward.”

Marvin hummed but didn’t attempt to take it away from Jameson, not that you would have let him.

“Some kind of ward, if it can hold this thing back for so long. Jameson, can you hear me?”

Jameson nodded, but when he opened his mouth to answer only a strangled sound came out.

“Don’t strain yourself. And don’t worry, we’re going to get you back to normal.” You saw Marvin’s eyes on the other side of that mostly white mask move to meet your own briefly as he added, “Promise.”

“Can you stand up for me, Jameson?”

It took some help from you and the magician, but Jameson managed to get to his feet and remain standing there, swaying softly on unsteady legs. Marvin gestured and you stepped back, outside of the chalk circle on the ground, leaving the two of them standing alone in the center.

“How do you know…Will this work?” you asked, feeling your words tangle together as you struggled to focus, to let all of this sink in while trying to keep away the sense that the room was slowly spinning around you. “Have—have you done this before?”

“My master was studying this kind of entity before—” Marvin paused, and for the first time you heard his voice break before he took a steadying breath of his own. “I’ve spent these last few months doing nothing but researching and perfecting the ritual he started, to weaken it and banish it from our reality for a few more centuries, if we’re lucky.”

“Your master?” You leaned against a creaking bookshelf as your mind went back to the woods. Back to the broken body this thing inside of Jameson left behind. “Was he—”

“Yes.” Marvin’s tone was short, clipped and shutting down any chance for more questions. “I need to focus.”

You watched as Marvin began to step around Jameson, hands glowing along with the four symbols on his mask as he gestured, his voice a steady, lulling murmur. Despite everything, despite your concern for Jameson and your pounding headache, you felt your eyes drift, each attempt to open them harder than the last.

Within the circle, Jameson’s eyes tracked Marvin’s movements as the magician prowled around him and the air itself began to feel thicker, charged with an energy that cracked and buzzed with each new whispered word. That is, until Marvin rounded the actor again and found a solid black set of eyes staring back at him, above a twisted smile.

“You…think this will work?” it asked, using Jameson’s voice. “ P͈͕̋̋at͎̯̣͐̈́͊h̠͚̟ͫ̉̋eṭ͙͒̿icͨ. I can’t wait to break you like your piti̤̗f̫͙͚̗̖u̝̰̠͕̲͔ͅl̰̣͍̼͈ master.” 

But Marvin saw the way the muscles in Jameson’s face and neck strained, fighting back against the words coming out of his mouth, the way his hand trembled with the silent battle to keep holding onto the silver watch held there.

“You’re going to be waiting for a while then,” Marvin said as he lunged forward, one hand on the back of Jameson’s neck, the other going to the actor’s chest, pinning that trembling hand holding the watch in between his own and Jameson’s beating heart. Marvin didn’t know what kind of magic had been written into the making of that watch, but he was going to need all the help he could get for this part.


	6. In the Moonlight

Marvin expected resistance. He had planned for it, prepared all kinds of nonlethal binding and attack spells to have ready at hand for this night. Granted, he expected that resistance to be coming from a homicidal otherworldly entity possessing a master magic user, not some little man in a waistcoat.

A little man with surprising strength, Marvin realized as Jameson’s entire body reacted to his touch, his head whipping back despite Marvin’s attempt to support his neck, solid black eyes twisting above a snarl as the hand not clenched tight around the silver watch pressed to his chest went for Marvin’s face.

Marvin’s eyes glowed behind his mask as he recited the incantation, doing his best to ignore the nails tearing at his skin and trying to find a grip on his jaw, and the way the head tried to twist away in his grip as those inhuman eyes met his before the snarl turned into a cruel smile.

“You think this will save theͬmͧͩ?” It laughed, Jameson’s chest shaking as he tried to fight the sound that ripped into his throat. “You can’t undo what I’ve done here tonight. O͟nce̼̬̥ a̧͎͈͔ pu͙̺͔p̰̱͝p̖̗͔e͕̠̘t, ͔͕͎a̲͔l̥w̘̺ay̭͡s̠ ̕a pu̜̼p͝p̳̪̲et͓͟.”

Marvin did not blink, turning his thoughts and emotions at those words into energy as the air within the chalk circle crackled and hummed with magic, swirling and tugging at Marvin’s cape and the brim of Jameson’s hat, a circling storm of bursting static and power centered on the two of them.

Until he spoke the last word and it stopped with an abrupt silence broken by a terrible, ragged scream as something dark began to pour out of Jameson’s eyes, mouth, and nose, at first like a thick liquid before it began to steam and rise up like a foul smoke, trailing and churning as it curled in on itself before disappearing with the echo of a distant laugh.

And then it was all Marvin could do to keep Jameson from sinking to the ground as the man’s legs buckled.

“Easy, easy,” Marvin said, trying to feign more assurance than he felt as he looked the actor up and down, his eyes drawn to a thin red line around Jameson’s neck that wasn’t there before. “Are you okay?”

“…”

Jameson’s mouth moved as his head lolled, but Marvin couldn’t hear what, if anything, he was trying to say.

“Jameson?”

His eyes opened at least, and Marvin had a brief second of relief when he saw they were back to normal before they suddenly widened. Out of reflex, Marvin reached for his mask, but as his fingertips brushed the smooth surface and confirmed it was still there, he realized Jameson’s eyes were looking past him, his mouth moving in a silent warning.

What Marvin did hear was a low, rumbling growl behind him, before Jameson grabbed his shoulders and pushed. The breath left Marvin’s chest in a rush as the two of them hit the stone floor, leaving nothing to give voice to the sheer panic when he saw the dark shape pass through the air where they had just been standing seconds before, claws tearing against stone in a terrible rasp as it turned to face them with a snarl.

The beast stood over half as tall as either of them on four legs, its dark fur a tangle that barely hid how the muscles underneath tensed for another attack, its hackles rising as its snout split to reveal a set of teeth, each one wider than Marvin’s fingers and so sharp they glistened in the torchlight.

“Move!” Marvin said, half-pulling and half-shoving Jameson behind him as he raised a hand, summoning a crackling ball of green fire, but just as he pushed forward to hurl the fire at the beast, Jameson knocked into him, sending the shot wide and leaving a dark stain on the wall just below the dome overhead.

Both men split ways as the beast leapt again, narrowly avoiding the snapping jaws as it overshot and crashed into one of the shelves, sending priceless tomes of magic showering down upon its back and head.

“What are you doing?” Marvin snapped at Jameson. “I had a clear shot!”

Jameson’s mouth moved and he gestured wildly, none of it making any sense to the magician.

“I can’t hear you! Just get your friend and—”

Marvin froze as he followed Jameson’s gesture from the empty part of the room where he last saw you and then at the massive beast shaking itself and turning back to face them.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Marvin muttered, backing away as the beast took a step forward, head swinging back and forth between the two of them as though trying to decide which to disembowel first. Keeping one eye on the beast, Marvin looked around, mind whirling desperately through options before landing on one he hoped might work. “Jameson, don’t move. I’m going to try to…”

He stepped to the left and, attracted by the movement, the beast turned its eyes on him. Marvin ran to the left and, as expected, it followed suit like a hunting dog chasing its prey.

Except Marvin turned and, the moment the beast stepped within the iron ring laid into the stone floor, he flung up his hand and uttered a word he had prepared for a different kind of monster.

The wolf lunged forward in the same moment, but its snapping jaws hit an invisible wall, a mere suggestion in the air above the circle.

“That should…that should hold it— _them_ ,” Marvin corrected himself as he bent over, gasping for breath. Using this much magic all at once was taking its toll, although seeing how close he cut that one hadn’t helped his frayed nerves. “Why didn’t you tell me your friend is a werewolf?!”

Jameson gestured, his meaning evident. It had been as much a surprise to him too, apparently.

Marvin paused and looked up, at the full moon clearly visible through the tower’s glass ceiling. The moon had risen hours ago, there’s no way you could have avoided turning before now. Unless…

_“You can’t undo what I’ve done here tonight.”_

“That thing, did it do something to them?” Marvin asked, feeling his heart drop when Jameson nodded.

The actor motioned with his hand before pressing it up against his own chest, then gesturing at the beast—at you, still scratching and snarling at the binding keeping it within the smaller circle, the pupils of your eyes so large that they drowned out all but a thin line of color on the edges. There was no sign that you recognized either of them.

Marvin straightened up and went to the desk, grabbing a more or less clean sheet of paper and something to write with before thrusting both toward Jameson.

“Describe everything you saw.” Marvin watched him start writing before looking back at the monster you had become, which began to prowl around the too small space of the circle, searching for a way out. “They…your friend…”

Jameson shook his head, unable to offer a name as Marvin stepped as close as he dared to the circle and said, for all the good it did, “We’re not going to leave you like this. I promise.”


	7. The Morning After

You opened your eyes and immediately groaned at the bright sunlight streaming in through the window before turning over and pulling the blanket up to your ears in an attempt to block out the unnecessarily loud birdsong going on outside. Your head pounded from even that much movement, and you spent several seconds lying there, blinking at the nightstand near your head where you could see your pocket watch waiting for you to start the day.

What time was it? It felt too late and a knot of worry filled your stomach as you reached out, trying desperately to remember even what day it was and if you were supposed to be at work right now.

The moment your fingers brushed the silver casing, pain shot up through your hand, your arm, straight into your heart, and the next thing you knew you were curled up in a ball under the blankets, trying not to scream.

You don’t know how long you lay there, trying to blink back tears, before the door to the room that was definitely not your own opened and the magician strolled in, Jameson on his heels.

“-bunch of simple-minded, backwater mouth breathers, every single one of them, it’s a good thing you’re planning on leaving that stupid little town Y/N—”

Marvin froze in the act of turning toward a black wardrobe with silver stars painted on and Jameson’s hand went up to nervously brush at his mustache as they both stared at you, waiting as though trying to gauge your reaction before Marvin said, “Oh, you’re up. Good. I mean—How do you feel? What do you remember?”

You looked from one face to the other as you slowly sat up, trying not to wince as your burnt fingertips pushed against the mattress beneath you.

“Not…a lot,” you admitted. You had been trying, desperately, to remember some kind of explanation. “I remember the woods, that—that _thing_ , and you bringing us here. Then you started some kind of spell to help Jameson, and I don’t…”

You paused in the act of brushing hair out of your face as the memory of Marvin and Jameson’s concerned faces, not that much different from now, leaning over you, a hand on the side of your head as Marvin spoke.

_“You’re okay, you’re okay, just—just sleep now, okay?”_

You remembered the panic of looking down, of realizing what you were before something in Marvin’s voice or touch sent you into a dreamless sleep. You looked down at your hand, hidden from their view by the blanket still pulled up around you, at the already swelling burns on the tips of three of your fingers from just a touch of silver.

The bed sank under Jameson’s weight as he sat down next to you, a comforting hand on your shoulder as he looked you in the eye before pulling you into a hug.

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” Marvin said softly. “I will keep looking, but…”

_But last night, when faced with the snarling, bloodthirsty beast trapped within the iron circle, there was only one spell he knew that could help._

_“This spell should bring them back,” Marvin explained to Jameson as he crawled around the outside of the iron circle, drawing a new circle out of shapes he checked against the book in hand with a broken piece of chalk. Once done, he walked around the circle three times, checking his work against the book’s illustrations and his own notes, continuing to speak as he did so. “It can’t undo a curse this strong, but it should—it_ will _give them back control of their body, their self.”_

_He corrected himself when he saw Jameson’s face, the way he stared at the thing in the circle that had once been you._

_Always act confident. It’s what his master had told him the first time they went out together to perform a working for a client. Half the magic is getting them to believe it will work. The other half came from you believing it would work._

_Marvin tried not to think about why he had this spell at the ready, how he had planned to use it as a last resort if the ritual hadn’t worked. A chance to say one last goodbye to his master that he would never have now._

_But, he thought as he bent down to make one last correction with the chalk before stepping back, he could still start trying to undo some of the harm done by his being too late._

_He began to speak, one hand gesturing while the other held the book up for him to read from, all focus on the words spilling out on the page before him and the twisting, contorting shape within the circle as the magic began to flow in and through him._

_Too late, he realized that this was yet another high-level spell, on top of everything else he had done tonight. Not even halfway through, he felt his hand begin to tremble with the effort of even holding the book up and his other began to drop as it took all he had to get the words out without slurring, knowing a slip of the tongue now could be almost as disastrous as stopping early._

_And then Jameson was there, one hand helping to support the book, the other on the magician’s back, steadying him long enough to speak the last words as the symbols on the ground glowed before fading back into chalk dust._

_The figure in the iron circle collapsed and Marvin would have done the same if not for Jameson. Together, they watched as the wolf lay there for a long, heart-stopping moment before one eyelid opened, revealing an eye too human to belong on an animal that looked around and then down at itself. As they approached, both men could hear the faint, tired whine from within the wolf’s chest, and Marvin saw the panic filling in your eyes as he knelt down next to you._

“You think this will save them?”

_Marvin’s hand trembled at the memory of those words, at the effort even the simple spell to send you to sleep took out of him._

It trembled now, hidden as he clasped his hands behind his back while he spoke, explaining that the spell would stay with you, allowing you to remain in control every time you changed until he could find a way to undo the curse.

“In time, you might even be able to learn how to control it and change even without a full moon—” Marvin cut himself short at your expression and cleared his throat, deciding that now might not be the best time to try and look for positives. “Not that, um…I just don’t know how long—”

Jameson shot him a glare and Marvin managed to stop himself and try again.

“It must have been one that my master knew, and that thing inside him took advantage of that,” he said, a thought he had wrestled with through the rest of the night and in the morning, when he and Jameson went back to the town. He knew his master would never resort to using something like that, that many magic users studied such things if only to protect themselves, but the thought did little to reassure him and the result was still the same. “Which means there has to be something written about it, someone who knows how the curse works, and from there how to break it.”

You nodded, but he wasn’t sure how much you were actually listening. When you finally did speak, it was to ask, “What about you, Jameson? Are you okay?”

Jameson smiled as he gave you an “okay” gesture to your confused expression, but with him still sitting next to you with one arm around your shoulders, you were more than close enough to see the sadness in his eyes.

“He hasn’t been able to speak a word since that thing left him,” Marvin explained. “Not for want of trying.”

Jameson frowned, and Marvin was almost glad he couldn’t quite make out what those words coming out of his mouth were supposed to mean, even if he could guess.

“That thing did something to your voice?”

Jameson shrugged, looking to Marvin for an answer.

“Maybe. Or it could be some kind of physical damage, I don’t know. I’m not exactly a doctor, but we’re going to try and fix it either way.”

You frowned, even as Jameson gave you a reassuring smile.

“But what about the movie, your crew? Everyone’s going to be worried—”

“That’s why we went to your town this morning. Took a bit of a charm and some fast talk, but as far as everyone is concerned, you two just got lost in the woods last night before I found you, and Jameson has decided to take some time away from his work for his own mental and physical health.” Marvin shrugged. “It’s not like we can tell them the real story. That’s how we found out your name, by the way. I started to track down your people, but maybe you’d rather…”

He trailed off at your expression and cleared his throat.

“So no one knows that I…what I am?”

“Like I would tell those people,” Marvin muttered darkly, and you wondered what kind of reaction the town elders had given to such an obvious and completely unknown magic user.

“I’ve been meaning to ask…” You saw the magician stiffen at your words. “What’s with the mask?”

“Your people use wards all the time, you know an object can be used to store up magical energy or serve as protection. Enchanted apparel is very common among magic users, and maybe masks aren’t exactly common, but—”

“No, I mean, sure, but why a cat?”

Jameson snickered and the lower half of Marvin’s face turned red despite his attempt to hold on to his dignity as he answered, “Have you ever met one? Cats are inherently magical creatures.”

Jameson gestured and Marvin scowled. “No, I’m not giving you anything to write with when you have that look on your face.”

Jameson turned to you to appeal this censorship, pausing only for a second when he saw the faint smile on your face before leaning into it and holding his hands to his chest in imitation of paws while making what was clearly meant to be a “meow” shape with his mouth.

Even as Marvin pushed Jameson and threatened to actually turn him into a cat, you could feel the faint relief coming from both men at being able to change the subject and try to take your mind off of last night, if only for a moment. They soon turned the subject to lunch, or breakfast for you, and you nodded along despite having no appetite, thinking you were hiding your feelings well enough until Jameson caught your sidelong glance at the nightstand, and the pocket watch on top of it.

He picked it up and offered it to you, but before Marvin could remind him you just shook your head.

“I can’t.”

The realization hit him and you could see the guilt in his eyes as you pushed his fingers closed over the silver casing.

“Can you take care of it for me?” You smiled as your grandfather’s words came back to you, even as you felt the tears prickle the corners of your eyes. “I’ve been told it’s very good to have around, if you’re the sort of person who needs all the help they can get.”

This time, when Jameson gestured, Marvin gave him the pencil and paper to write his response for you to read before gently pulling you into another hug.

_“Until the day I can give it back to you, I’ll never let it go. On my heart.”_


	8. Moving Forward

Even without your precious watch, time kept moving forward.

Three months later, you found yourself sitting outside of the admissions and financial affairs office, leg jumping up and down with the anxiety of being able to do nothing but sit and wait to learn what would become of your hopes and dreams.

Three months later, and you still missed the comforting weight of the watch, the steady, ceaseless tick grounding you in the moment while reminding you of the man who gave it to you, the faint memory of the woman who made it special. Now, your fingers fidgeted, tapping on your knees when they weren’t interlaced together in a knot as though trying to hold on tight to yourself.

You barely noticed the receptionist at her desk, who was polite enough to leave you alone, or the people walking up and down the hall, university employees or students who were just tying up the last few loose ends before the start of a new semester, their conversations passing over your head as you ran through the same thoughts you had every day for the last three months.

Three full moons. Three evenings where Marvin would come to retrieve you and bring you back to his tower, where he and Jameson tried to provide what support they could. You didn’t think you would ever get used to those nights, when your body would twist and change despite every attempt to hold it back, leaving you in that form until the sun rose and brought you to human again.

At least you could stay in control, although without the raw, overwhelming instinct of the beast taking over, the forced transformation left you so tired that you spent most of those nights just lying there, watching Marvin pour over spell books or giving a weak thump of the tail whenever Jameson spoke to you, his fingers still fumbling over the more unfamiliar signs.

There was no escaping your new reality, even outside of those nights. Your senses of smell and hearing seemed to have been permanently affected, to the point you nearly had a panic attack on your first day back at your bakery job when a cacophony of noises and smells hit you all at once and just would not stop. Three months had given you time to learn how to take it all in and ignore what you could, and tricks to distract yourself from what you couldn’t.

Mostly. 

Right now, with your nerves on end, you could hear the tick tick tick of the clock on the wall, every rustle of paper on every desk in the office, smell and identify exactly what scent of perfume the receptionist was wearing that didn’t quite hide the scent her cat left on her, no doubt rubbing against her leg on the way out this morning. You took a slow, steadying breath, the grip on your hands tightening as you forced yourself to rein it in a little before it became too much. You were getting better at that, at least.

But it didn’t matter how in control you were, as Marvin made no hesitation in telling you before he would let you go back home after that first night. Once people heard the word ‘werewolf’, there would be no going back. They would only see a monster, and you knew even without his unnecessarily graphic stories what happened to monsters.

And you hardly needed the reminder, when your nightmares were willing to do that at least once a week.

Which is why, if your request to be exempted from the university policy for freshmen and allowed to stay off campus in a private apartment was denied, your dream of law school would be dead in the water. It didn’t matter what kind of scholarships or student work they could offer at that point. All of your work, all of your saving and hoping and praying, would all be for nothing.

And then you heard the words that sent your hammering heart plummeting downward.

“Y/N? Could you come in here?”

You don’t know how long you were in there. The waiting area seemed to spin around you as you walked out of the office, and you don’t even know what you said in response to the receptionist on your way out of the building. You certainly didn’t see the two young men walking in, and they were too occupied in their own conversation to pay attention to where they were going.

“I’m telling you, that was Jackson back there,” one of the young guys had been saying, his head turned to look back over his shoulder.

“Why would some famous actor be here?”

“I don’t know, but I’m going to—Watch it!”

His warning came too late, as the three of you tried to enter and exit by the same door all at the same time.

“Sorry, that’s on me,” his friend apologized, but you shrugged it off with a smile so dazzling that he unconsciously found himself returning it as he stepped aside to let you through.

At the door, they turned and watched as you practically flew down the steps of the building to the other two men waiting there, pulling both into a hug with an excited shout.

“Huh. That’s interesting.”

“Mark.”

“I’m just saying, maybe we should introduce ourselves and try to make a good first impression. With a potential new classmate, I mean.”

“Or, you could try to be on time for your appointment. Come on.”

“You’re no fun, Damien, you know that, right?”

The two incoming freshmen weren’t the only ones to throw looks your way, not that you cared as you told Jameson and Marvin the good news.

“—even suggested a place that sounds perfect, private and not too far from campus, and with the living stipend for working on campus I should be able to just afford it!”

The tone in the admissions counselor’s voice and the words chosen had suggested it was the kind of place that the owners had given up on and just needed a tenant to justify the taxes involved in keeping it, but if anything that only made it sound more perfect, even despite the warnings that between studying and working to keep your stipend you wouldn’t have much time to socialize.

The more distance you could keep between yourself and others, the better.

_That’s great_ , Jameson signed with a proud, beaming smile. _I told you it would work out!_

If Jameson was attracting any attention, he seemed either unaware of it or deliberately ignoring it. It didn’t help that his name had been in the newspapers multiple times over the past couple of months with the closure of his studio and rumors swirling around his health. Jameson had brushed it off to you, saying that his last film would be enough to pay off the banks once all was said and done, but you suspected Marvin was keeping at least as close an eye on him as you, if not more so.

Marvin himself was attracting a few stares, thanks in large part to the huge aviator glasses he had donned in place of his mask for this occasion, the reflective lenses managing to hide almost the same amount of face as his regular mask. His outfit certainly helped, as the stylish green and blue suit somehow managed to stick out more than his usual robes ever would have.

“Shame, I was really hoping we could talk you into coming with us,” Marvin said with a teasing smile. “Offer’s still open, of course.”

“Tempting, but I’m going to have to pass.”

“Oh, well, maybe you’ll flunk out,” Marvin said, turning his head to avoid Jameson’s shaming finger.

“…When are you two leaving?” you asked.

_Tomorrow_ , Jameson signed, proving the answer hadn’t changed since the last time you asked.

“We only stayed this long to make sure you would be okay,” Marvin said, earning a glare from Jameson. “What? It’s true.”

“Thank you,” you said, even as you felt the joy of the admissions offer dwindling at the thought. Impulsively, you blurted out, “Are you sure though? About going all the way to Germany?”

Marvin shrugged while Jameson’s shoulders sagged. “From what I hear, this doctor is worth it. And finding someone with the kind of…experience we need isn’t exactly easy.”

Three months, and still no word from Jameson. You weren’t sure how many doctors they had tried closer to home, or other contacts from Marvin’s line of work, and still there was no answer on what could be causing it, whether a curse or something more physical.

“I know,” you said. “Promise me you won’t forget to write, at least.”

Marvin reached out and gripped your hand tightly in his own, and for just a moment you could almost make out his eyes behind those ridiculous sunglasses. “We won’t forget you. I promise.”

Jameson wasn’t the only one they were hoping to find something for in their travels, after all.

You turned to Jameson, who did not hesitate before pulling you into one last hug.

“We’re going to be okay, right?”

He nodded in silent agreement and you felt his grip tighten just that little bit more as you returned the hug.

This close together, you could for just a moment feel the beat of his heart, or maybe it was your own. That, or it could be the ticking of the silver watch that never strayed far from his person. A steady, rhythmic reminder that time hadn’t stopped.

And neither had you.


End file.
